


Peace on Earth

by dearonedriveon



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - No City of Light (The 100), Alternate Universe - No Praimfaya | Radiation Wave, Amnesia, Canon Rewrite, Eventual Smut, F/F, Lexa Lives, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-31
Updated: 2019-04-16
Packaged: 2019-12-30 01:08:23
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,535
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18305081
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dearonedriveon/pseuds/dearonedriveon
Summary: Clarke wakes up in a hospital bed in Mount Weather with no memory of how she got there, or what she's doing on Earth.





	1. Chapter One

Clarke wakes up slowly to the whirring sound of ventilation and the smell of recirculated air, the way she has every morning of her seventeen year old life.

Until she opens her eyes and sees a cement ceiling.

She’s in a hospital bed in a white room, bruised where an IV drips into her left arm. Gazing over the various medical instruments of the room, she reads her own parameters — heart rate, blood sugar, oxygen — and searches her memory for diagnosis that would explain where she is or why she’s here. On the wall, painfully vivid juxtaposed to the white of every other surface, is the best Van Gogh duplicate Clarke has ever seen. Or she thinks it’s a duplicate.

She sits up in her hospital bed, and mentally inventories the aches of her body, and comes up with nothing more than the pain of disuse. She surveys her exposed skin — her forearms, mostly, in the hospital gown — and finds her skin red as if it’s been scrubbed but unscathed, save for the diamond-shaped tattoo on her right forearm where the silhouettes of trees meet the starry night sky.

She has never seen a tattoo in real life before.

The door opens.

“Good morning, Clarke,” says a woman in a lab coat, adjusting her glasses as she scribbles Clarke’s vitals on a chart, “I’m Doctor Tsing and you’re in the Mount Weather medical facility.”

Clarke swallows harshly and licks her lips, “What happened to me? I can’t remember,” She clears her throat and tries not to sound small, “Is my mother here?”

Doctor Tsing pauses in her notes and meets Clarke’s eyes, lips twitching momentarily in a way that Clarke interprets as a poorly concealed smile but dismisses as a trick of the lighting.

She uses a small light to check Clarke’s pupil responsiveness as she explains, neutrally, “You were found unconscious with evidence of a concussion. What is the last thing you remember, Clarke?”

“I remember,” Clarke pauses in consideration and with significant effort, pulls a memory, “I remember my parents fighting.”

Doctor Tsing clicks off her pen light and, taking a seat in a bedside rolling chair, regards Clarke.

“You were found unconscious near an escape pod landing site in the territory previously known as Virginia. Alone."

Clarke feels tears gathering in her rapidly blinking eyes, “I don’t understand.”

“Confusion is a common symptom of concussion,” Doctor Tsing explains, and her neutral, professional tone grounds Clarke, “Retrograde amnesia surrounding the details of the source of the trauma is especially common. It is likely that you will recall details with time.”

Clarke wipes the few escaped tears from her cheeks.

Doctor Tsing stands and begins the process of removing Clarke’s IV, “In the meantime, if you are feeling well enough, President Wallace would like to speak to you over dinner. Clothes are in the chest at the end of the bed.”

Doctor Tsing lingers as Clarke stands for the first time. She feels shaky but not faint and supposes she’ll be fine to meet this president.

“I’ll give you a few minutes,” says Doctor Tsing, and then she leaves Clarke to dress.

Clarke inspects the offerings inside the chest at the end of the hospital bed. It’s a collection of mostly dresses and high heeled shoes — luxuries Clarke has never had access to in the Ark. She lets her hands drift across the fabrics and decides she must be dreaming, but even so, she’s practical as ever, selecting the outfit most similar to the uniforms of the ark. 

It isn’t long after Clarke has finished changing that an armed guard in a khaki uniform comes to collect her. He’s professional and polite, and Clarke feels no differently toward him than she did toward the guards on the Ark. At least if she’s going to wake up in a society thousands of miles from everyone she’s ever known or loved, it’s familiar to her.

Her eyes wander the corridors and vestibules as the guard leads her to the president’s offices. The stay-time signs and radiation warnings of the decontamination areas thin out as the tac numbers stenciled on the wall designating the distance from centerline lower. It’s based on a naval system, not unlike the Ark’s method. She doesn’t have to count the frames of concrete to know how far she’s gone, it’s marked all over the place. It makes the map she’s drafting in her head simple, even as her head spins with disbelief. A hundred years, she thinks, floating in space, while people survived on the ground the whole time.

They have walked for ten minutes, including a brief elevator ride, when the guard stops in front of a door bearing the seal of the President of the United States. He knocks. Clarke wipes her sweaty palms on her utility pants discretely, before the guard opens the door. 

The President of the United States is a frail, gray man in a worn suit with his tongue stuck out between his lips and his brow furrowed in concentration as he applies oil paint to a canvas of a realist landscape. He doesn’t look up at Clarke as she enters the room, but he knows she’s there.

“Good afternoon, Ms. Griffin. How are you feeling?”

“Like I woke up on another planet,” she deadpans, but then remembers herself after a beat, “Mr. President.”

He laughs at that, setting his paint aside and finally turning his head to look at her, “I suppose that’s warranted. But I meant to ask after your health, I’m told you were found unconscious.”

Clarke looks down at her hands, no longer glib about the situation, “It doesn’t hurt, but I don’t remember anything about coming down here,” she confesses. When she looks back up, he gestures her toward a seat which she takes. 

“Nonetheless,” he begins, moving to sit in a chair behind his desk and looking altogether much more presidential behind his name plate, “I believe your arrival has been a testament to the universe’s sympathy for mankind.”

Clarke blinks, taken aback by the grandiosity of his statement.

“My people survived the bombs inside this containment. Without protective equipment, the radiation outside would kill us,” he explains, “but we found you outside and you are fine. Well, with the exception of your concussion.”

“Because I’m acclimated to solar radiation,” Clarke concludes thoughtfully.

“Exactly,” the President smiles, pleased, “Ms. Griffin, with my resources and your people’s biological tolerances, we could restart the human race on earth.”

Clarke can’t even speak, she’s so overcome with possibilities, but the President is patient. Clarke licks her chapped lips before speaking.

“How do we start?”

 

It’s maybe three hours later that Clarke finds herself in an engineering space with President Wallace and a group of engineers as they tinker with the frequency of a long range radio. 

 “Mecha Station, Rey—“ she hears, before they tune the radio to another frequency.

 “Wait,” she says, “Go back to that last one.”

 “—Station, Reyes, shield inspection sat.” 

Clarke grabs the mouthpiece without asking permission, “Ark, Clarke Griffin, communications check.” 

“Reyes, Mecha Station, communication check satisfactory. Shield inspection sat, aye.”

“Ark, Clarke Griffin,” she tries again, enunciating obnoxiously, “Communicating from Earth, communications check.”

“Nice one, Reyes,” says the phone talker in Mecha Station, breaking formality. Clarke laughs roughly, equal parts relieved and annoyed.

“Mecha Station, Reyes, that wasn’t me.” Then, after a beat and sounding noticeably incredulous even from thousands of miles away, “Earth, Reyes, say again.”

“Ark, Clarke Griffin, communicating from Mount Weather Facility on Earth, request communications patch to Alpha Station,” Clarke says, slowly and clearly, her eyes locked with President Wallace who nods encouragingly.

“Communicating from Mount Weather Facility on Earth, request communications patch to Alpha Station, Clarke Griffin, Ark, aye. Wait one,” repeats the phone talker in Mecha Station, formality returned, though Clarke knows for certain that there’s nothing in the space interior communications manual dictating this crazy situation.

The wait feels long, but it probably isn’t more than a few minutes before a new voice comes over the radio.

“Clarke,” says Jaha, like he never expected to say her name again, but he corrects himself quickly, “Clarke Griffin, Chancellor Jaha, communications check.” 

“Chancellor Jaha, Clarke, communications check sat,” she says, not able to hold back a relieved laugh. 

“Report location,” he says, all business, and it’s strange because even though she knows him as the Chancellor she knows him more as Wells’ dad.

“Mount Weather Facility on Earth,” she says, “I’m sitting here with President Wallace of the United States. Chancellor, there are survivors on Earth.”

There’s a long pause. The president takes the mouthpiece, “Good evening, Chancellor Jaha.”

“Good evening, Mr. President,” Jaha replies, neutral, but several voices can be heard shouting in the background. She can only imagine the shit show going down in Alpha Station’s command center. 

“You can imagine,” he continues with some effort, obviously having to yell over other people, “my surprise at this communication.”

“I believe so. Chancellor, before my people found Ms. Griffin, we had no idea there were survivors on the space stations.” The president pauses and then decides to add, “And certainly no idea that earth was survivable, for anyone.”

“Earth is survivable,” repeats Jaha, in obvious shock. 

“Yes, Chancellor,” the president continues, “And I have initiated this communication to formally extend an offer of alliance and shared resources, for when you and your people come to Earth.”

“For when we come to Earth,” Jaha repeats again. 

The president smiles and looks to Clarke, his hand off the mouthpiece, “Ms. Griffin, I believe I can handle these matters for now. Mr. Lovejoy will escort you to your quarters so you can get some rest. I know Doctor Tsing intends to run some more tests on you in the morning.”

Clarke wants to stay, but knows that she isn’t privy to all matters, just as she wasn’t on the Ark. She says her goodnight and allows herself to be lead to a hangar style barracks room where she’s the only resident.

She changes into the pajamas she finds laid out for her on the bed and brushes her teeth in a communal bathroom, but finds herself wandering passage ways on the way back. 

If it had been that easy to communicate with the Ark, how had it taken a hundred years? She roams aimlessly, using the key card they gave her to open any door she can.

She remembers a bedtime story her father once told her about Bluebeard and his wives — how he killed them, one by one, and left their corpses in a locked room, how he gave his wives the key to that awful room.

But she finds no room of ex-wives corpses, no cause for the strange distrust settling in her stomach, and so she goes to sleep.

 

“This will just be a small pinch,” Doctor Tsing says, inserting a needle into Clarke’s right arm the next morning, “Go ahead and lay back. This is a substantial blood sample and you may feel some dizziness.”

Clarke nods, obeying patiently. 

“I’ve got a few patients to check on. I’ll be back in fifteen minutes or so.” Doctor Tsing takes off her gloves and gestures with her head to a small button near the instrument panels, “if you need anything at all, you can page me with that.” 

Clarke nods again, and watches her blood slowly move through the tube into the sample bag. Doctor Tsing leaves the clinic, leaving Clarke with one other patient.

He’s two beds away, unconscious with strange burns on his face, and Clarke isn’t letting it on, but that feeling in her stomach hasn’t gone away.

She looks closer and watches as blood enters and exits a port in his chest, pumped from an external machine near his bed. She follows the source of the blood to a pipe along the ceiling coming from another room.

Bluebeard’s wives, she thinks.

She pulls the stand with her blood bag along with her as she tiptoes across the room to the door accessing the next space. Locked. No keycard access point this time, just an old fashion keyhole. 

She spots a duct along the floor.

She pulls the needle out of her arm and wraps a compress around her small wound quickly. Making quick work of the grate serving as a covering for the duct’s opening, she squirms through, too distracted with the tight fit to look into the next room until she’s fully inside of it. She brushes herself off as she stands, and the sight that greets her turns that feeling of distrust in the pit of her stomach to full nausea.

It’s a man.

Tattooed and tanned and bearded and altogether unlike the men she has seen before, but no less a man.

Dressed only in gauze underwear, hanging upside down, being drained of his blood.

Clarke moves further into the room, inspecting the various instruments surrounding the man. He’s alive, she notes, but clearly weakened or drugged. Clarke feels faint, on the precipice of panic, trembling with helplessness and nausea when she hears the one thing that makes this whole situation even more bizarre.

Her own name.

“Clarke,” a voice hisses from behind her.  

She turns to see rows of cages, full of people in no better states than the one hanging upside down. Women and men, tattooed and wild, and caged like animals.

Except for the last cage on the right. She kneels down to inspect its inhabitant.

Bright green eyes, shining with tears stare back at her. 

“Clarke,” the girl whispers reverently, all wild brunette hair and tattoos and tan skin covering slender muscles.

“I thought you were dead,” the girl says, and Clarke watches a tear fall down her cheek as she realizes in a detached sort of way that the girl isn’t speaking English, but Clarke can still understand her, “I thought they had killed you.”

“I’m sorry, I don’t know who you are,” and she is sorry, watching this girl cry makes her chest ache, “They said I hurt my head.”

Clarke watches the girl wipe tears from her cheeks and study her. 

“Clarke, the mountain men are not to be trusted. We need to get out of here.”

Clarke doesn’t need her memories to decide that the girl in the cage is more trustworthy than the place draining human beings for blood. 

She nods and eyes the room for something to break the lock. She pulls a wire cover off the wall and puts it through the lock, pushing until it breaks.

Once the lock is off, the girl pushes her cage door open and stands, muscles rippling, to her full height, two or so inches taller than Clarke.

She moves into Clarke’s space with searching eyes, brushing blonde hair behind her ears and Clarke gulps at her intense gaze. She looks down, only to find a beautiful body, essentials barely covered in white gauze. 

She lifts her trembling hands, fingertips grazing along the girls sinewy forearms, where a tattoo matching the one Clarke found on herself lies.

Lips brush her cheek. She can't justify leaning into it, but she does.

Her thumb catches on a bump and she pulls herself away to look at it. The girls eyes follow hers.

“I think it’s a tracker,” Clarke muses. She retrieves a scalpel from the tray near the harvest station and returns to the girl, who doesn’t seem concerned at being approached with a weapon.

Clarke looks into her eyes, nervousness returned, “I have to cut it out.” The girl nods once and offers her arm. Clarke supports it with one hand and cuts with her left hand, still shaking slightly. The girl doesn’t make a sound. Clarke wraps it with some spare mesh, eyes flicking between the wound and the girls face, “Do you know a way out of here?”

The girl’s jaw works side to side as she thinks, and then Clarke is being pulled through a door into a room barely larger than a closet. Clarke watches her hand pause over a panel on the wall, “I don’t know what comes after this,” she admits.

Clarke nods and, without hesitation, slams the side of her closed fist into the operator.

The floor falls out below them. 

They tumble down a dark chute, bodies colliding gracelessly and stopping suddenly in a heap on the floor of a cave.

Clarke clumsily gathers herself to her feet, rubbing the back of her head, to find that the brunette is already up surveying the cavern for a way out. 

She takes Clarke’s hand casually and guides her forward. Clarke takes this as an opportunity to study the way the intricate tattoos of her back dance over her muscles as she walks.

“What did you say your name was?” she whispers.

The cave is dim, but it’s well lit enough for Clarke to recognize the look she gets over the girls shoulder as a warning glance.

Too bad it’s too late.

“Ten-Ninety Eight,” says a voice, robotic in a way that reminds Clarke of the voice modulators on the masks of space suits, “Two subjects. Ten-ninety eight. Return Clarke Griffin alive.”

The voice is behind them and Clarke isn’t sure by how much. The girl picks up the pace, pulling Clarke along behind her. The cave splits off in tunnels, but the girl leading her doesn’t stop to consider her path. She just keeps running forward, fearless and certain.

The cave opens suddenly into a mouth.

“We have to jump,” the girl says, peering over the edge into the pool of a dam. 

“I can’t,” Clarke says, panting from the run, “I can’t swim.”

“Clarke,” she says, turning to face her, hands out to clutch at her but not making contact, “Your mind has forgotten, but your body will remember.”

Footsteps approach. There are more of them now. They can both hear it.

The girls face goes hard and her hands finally grasp Clarke’s upper arms, “I’m sorry, Clarke,” she says.

And then she throws her off the cliff.

 

“I have decided that I don’t like you,” Clarke says, coughing up water minutes later, when the girl pulls her to shore. 

“So long as you stay alive to continue disliking me,” the girl says, unimpressed with Clarke’s ire, as she examines their surroundings. The girls gauze coverings have gone kind of transparent and Clarke finds that even her first real look at Earth isn’t enough to keep her eyes away.

Clarke watches, mesmerized, as the girl licks her index finger and puts it up to gauge the direction of the wind. She nods to herself and pulls Clarke upwind. 

They hike hours through forests, crossing rivers and butterflies, collecting berries as they go. Clarke tries to make conversation, but the girl enforces silence, and Clarke supposes she has good reason.

The sun is setting when the girl — still barefoot and barely-clothed, but now covered in a layer of dirt and mud— releases Clarke’s hand and slows down. 

Clarke takes a seat on a nearby rock, panting slightly, as she watches the girl meander, hopping strangely like she’s looking for something underground.

A patch of fluorescent fungus catches Clarke’s eye, and she crouches down for a closer look, for the first time letting her mind ruminate on the fact that she is on earth. She thinks of the stories her father used to tell her at bedtime, passed down from generations, all second-hand. How she was never meant to see this.

“Clarke,” says the girl, closer than before, “I’ve found a shelter for the night.”

Clarke nods and stands to follow, bone weary and mentally exhausted from the day, but the girl takes her arm tenderly, leading her into a hatch in the forest floor and sitting her down. Clarke watches from a couch as she seals the hatch and rummages through the kitchen area of the shelter.

“Is it safe to talk now?” Clarke asks.

The girl hums in the affirmative, turning on the tap to see if the plumbing works. It does. Clarke watches her test the temperature.

“Who are you?”

The girl turns off the tap abruptly. With a flexed jaw, she approaches Clarke, taking a seat on the coffee table directly in front of her. Clarke can see her mulling over her words.

She offers Clarke her left forearm, where Clarke can see a diamond shaped tattoo of the silhouettes of trees meeting the starry night sky.

Just like the one on her forearm.

Clarke rolls up her right sleeve to compare.

“I’m called Lexa,” the girl says softly, “We are bound to one another.”

Clarke’s eyes flick up to her face, but her green eyes are so gentle that Clarke has to look away. 

Ears tipped pink, she runs her index finger along Lexa’s forearm tattoo, subtly studying the rest of her body, gaze toeing the line between artistic curiosity and lewdness.

“How long have I been here?”

“Last summer was your second,” Lexa explains patiently, “My people found you half-delirious in the forest, but you had your memories.”

She’s been on the ground for over a year.

“Your people?”

“Our people,” Lexa corrects, chastised like this is an old argument. She takes Clarke’s hand in hers and begins to massage her palm.

“No, I mean, there are other survivors out here?”

“Many,” she explains, “I united the twelve clans several winters ago.”

Clarke’s mind is reeling, every revelation contrary to the information presented to her by the people in the mountain. She’s grateful for the pressure of Lexa’s touch keeping her grounded.

“Why am I here?” She asks, voice trembling.

Lexa’s hands still and she looks up at Clarke’s face.

“Your father sent you,” she says carefully, but with a little difficulty as if some of the explanation is beyond her, “Your home couldn’t support your people for much longer.  But your ship was damaged, you couldn’t communicate with your people.”

Clarke laughs bitterly.

“Well, I did. Just like the mountain wanted.”

Lexa’s brow furrows, “You spoke with your people?”

“Yes,” she grumbles, pushing the palms of her hands against her eyes in hopes that the pressure will prevent her from crying, “I practically set up an alliance conference for them. I made them think it’s safe here. With those monsters...”

Lexa whispers her name in this soft way that really isn’t helping her with this whole not crying thing and grips Clarke’s wrists, gently tugging to uncover her eyes.

Clarke drops her hands but keeps her eyes shut tightly. Even so, she can feel the wobbles of her traitorous chin.

She hears Lexa get up and walk away. And, after a moment, the squeaking of pipes in the walls and the sound of running water in another room. 

Lexa returns to pull at an arm, gentle but firm, and makes no further efforts to open Clarke’s eyes, which she is grateful for. She allows herself to be lead.

A bath, she thinks as she steps into the new room, overcome with the sound of water hitting porcelain. She’s never had a bath. Hygiene had been bi-weekly timed showers, not even people in power were allowed to defy water rations. 

It’s not until Clarke’s shirt is being tugged up that she opens her eyes.

To a fully naked girl.

“Um,” Clarke says, tears forgotten and stunned stupid enough to allow her shirt to be pulled over her head. 

She snaps to reality when calloused fingers brush the skin just above her underwear as they move to undo the button of her pants. Underwear that she’s definitely going to have to replace...

“Oh,” she says, and it definitely doesn’t sound squeaky, “I can do that.”

She turns around, awkwardly fiddling with the zipper of her utility pants and trying not to think about the girl behind her — her wife? partner? girlfriend? she’s going to need some clarification, she supposes.

“I had forgotten that it was not a custom of your people to bathe together,” says Lexa. Clarke huffs a little at how obviously amused she is.

“We do it so frequently,” she continues, a voice lowering a little in suggestion. And oh, isn’t that just the prettiest picture…

Clarke distracts herself from those thoughts by taking her remaining clothes off and, checking the temperature, she shuts off the tap before climbing in gingerly. She watches the water level rise as Lexa sits down into the tub behind her, not touching her.

Not yet.

Starting at her throat just under her chin, a rough, steaming clothe makes a slow path over her shoulder and down her back that makes her eyes flutter shut. 

She feels Lexa fashion her hair into a quick braid and push it to the side, allowing her to draw the same path on the newly exposed side.

“You torture yourself with things you cannot change,” Lexa says, but it’s not mean, it’s more like she knows intimately what it feels like.

She hears the clothe dip into the water and can’t fight the sigh when it starts a new path on her back.

“It’s my fault,” Clarke says. She opens her eyes and tests the surface tension of the water with the tips of her fingers.

Lexa halts her fidgeting by starting a slow path with her towel at Clarke’s wrist, up to her shoulder, that leaves her skin red and clean and goose-bumped.

“You have forgotten your desperation to bring your people to the ground,” Lexa reminds her, switching to her other arm, “Perhaps we can use this, but not if your mind is clouded with guilt.”

She winces a little when Lexa’s towel runs over a tender spot in her inner bicep, but she’s so focused on Lexa’s words that she doesn’t even think about it.

They make her feel brave.

So the next time Lexa picks a new path — this time beginning just below her sternum, Clarke places her hand over the clothe to stop her.

“Let me,” she says, and feels Lexa release it.

She fixes a neutral expression on her face and, taking a deep breath, turns in the bath to face Lexa.

Her hair is braided back now, too, and her face is still dirty but Clarke’s eyes trace the slope of her forehead down her high cheekbones to the line of her clenched jaw. Dipping the towel, she starts a path there and watches Lexa’s full lips fall open in a trembling breath.

She distracts herself from the rise of goosebumps on tan skin and the pebbling of dark pink nipples by naming muscles as she cleans — from trapezius over her sternum, to watching the clench of abdominals as she skims down to the tops of her thighs, which are barely sticking out of the water.

“I remember how it felt, you know,” Clarke says as Lexa turns in the now lukewarm bath water to allow her access to her back.

She sees Lexa’s head tilt in a way that she interprets as attentiveness.

“How I felt,” she amends, “How I feel,” she tries again, scrubbing at a particularly dirty spot under Lexa’s left scapula.

“I can’t remember anything, not even why I’m here,” she continues, and she knows everything she’s saying is a mess that hardly she can even follow but she needs Lexa to hear it, “but I still feel it.”

She rinses the clothe and tries for something lighter, “I mean, I don’t just get into baths with strangers.”

Lexa smiles, small but amused, over her shoulder at her.

Clarke wishes she could remember what it tastes like.


	2. Chapter Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clarke tries to navigate the strangeness and familiarity of Lexa.

In the early hours of the next morning, Clarke wakes up miserably hot to kick her blankets off. 

They’d taken over one of the dusty, abandoned bedrooms in the bunker with a queen size bed and a long-spoiled collection of expensive perfumes piled high on an antique vanity. Cheeks still tinted pink from sharing a bath and hair wrapped in a towel turban, Clarke had ransacked the armoire for suitable vestments with surprising success, including a little something extra in the form of a 2014 issue of Playboy magazine.

After sharing a quick meal of trapped rabbit, they’d changed into oversized mens pajamas and slipped under the covers with no less than a foot of space between them.

If only, Clarke huffs. Right into Lexa’s soft hair.

She tries for the third time to free the arm hugged against Lexa’s chest, forcing her into a big spoon position that is entirely unsuitable for the lack of airflow in the bunker.

“Mm,” mumbles Lexa, and Clarke could swear that she sounds almost pleased at the movement, as she tightens her grip on Clarke’s arm. 

Lips pursed, Clarke gives her arm a rough, petty tug she’s certain will liberate her.

“Shh,” says her sleeping captor, pulling her hand up to nuzzle and kiss the wrist before guiding it under her cheek.

Laying her head back down on their shared pillow, Clarke decides she likes the heat.

  


Hours later, Clarke wakes up to the sound of the bedroom door opening in a cool, empty bed. She turns her head toward the sound and sees Lexa leaning in the doorway with a bowl and a small, private smile on her face.

“Good morning,” says Lexa, eyes wandering without subtly as Clarke sits up and stretches.

“Good morning,” Clarke returns when she’s done yawning. She smiles at Lexa as Lexa takes a seat on the bed and offers her the bowl, “I found your favorite in the cupboards.”

Clarke looks into the bowl to see the salmon berries they’d collected the previous day covered in something that looks thick and sticky. Scrunching her nose, she looks up back up to Lexa’s face to see if she’s joking.

Lexa rolls her eyes and brings up a honey-covered berry to Clarke’s lips. Cheeks tinted pink, Clarke opens her mouth to allow Lexa to feed her, but soon finds herself reaching for the bowl once the taste hits her tongue. She likes the taste so much she doesn’t even stop to admire Lexa licking the honey off her fingers, but then again, Clarke has always been a good multi-tasker.

“You still remember nothing,” Lexa states decisively, though Clarke isn’t certain if her conclusion is based on Clarke’s response to honey or to being fed. Mouth full of berries, Clarke studies Lexa’s stoic expression. 

”Yes,” Clarke admits after swallowing. Feeling a little guilty, she adds, “I wish I remembered.”

Lexa hums noncommittally, studying the bedroom wall in front of her. Clarke wishes her hands weren’t so sticky so she could hold of Lexa’s.

Lexa moves behind Clarke on the bed, one leg folded and one hanging off the side, as she begins combing through Clarke’s bed head with her fingers. Clarke can’t help the shudder that runs up her spine as goosebumps begin forming.

“You must stay close when we return to our people,” Lexa says after a few moments of nothing but the sound of Clarke chewing berries, “There are many that wish to use you.”

“Why?” Clarke asks. She feels the familiar tug and pull of a braid beginning.

Lexa finishes the braid and moves in front of Clarke to check the front of her hair. Eyes fixed on Clarke’s hair, she says, “To hurt me.”

Clarke knows there’s something here to be uncovered -- something she’s already uncovered, but can’t remember. She studies Lexa’s eyes as she feels a thumb glide across her cheek. It lifts and goes to trace along the cleft of her chin.

“Beautiful,” Lexa says when she finally meets her eyes. If she had her memories, Clarke thinks this would be when Lexa would kiss her.

But she doesn’t, so Lexa stands off the bed and heads toward the door.

“Get dressed and we’ll go,” she says as she exits.

  


By the time they’ve reached a village with the remains of Lincoln Memorial standing sentinel at its entrance, it’s dark enough that Clarke can barely appreciate it. She trails behind as Lexa speaks in hushed tones with a sharp-faced blonde who Lexa had told her was called Anya, who emerged from the trees a mile out from the village. Clarke feels her stomach growling in relief when they finally reach the communal fire pits in the center of the village where the scent of roasting meats permeates the air. 

The people here are different, Clarke notices. She’d grown up on the Ark with rations that maintained slim figures but prevented significant musculature. In the mountain, they’d been significantly better fed but idle from lack of necessity.

Out on the ground, the people are hulking and browned. They are dressed in furs and leathers with intimidating tattoos and large knives. She believes Lexa’s story about her time here, but even so, Clarke knows her relative paleness and bright hair makes her stand out among the people of the ground. It scares her, but she doesn’t show it. 

The two in front of her slow down to allow her to catch up.

“I must make preparations with Indra,” says Lexa, watching the way Clarke’s eyes linger on the roasting meats, “Anya will ensure you are cared for,” she says, sending a stern look toward Anya.

“Yes, Heda,” Anya says mechanically, eying Clarke with a hint of derision. Clarke wonders at the history between them.

Lexa pauses for a moment and draws herself up, spine straight and hands clasped behind her back. It occurs to Clarke that this is the first time they’d really separate since they’d been captured by the mountain. She watches Lexa’s green eyes flicker across her form.

“I’ll be fine,” she says, hoping it reassures Lexa even if she herself feels a little anxious about it.

It seems to be enough, because Lexa gives her one curt nod as a goodbye and marches off in the direction of Indra’s tent.

  
  


But maybe she spoke too soon, because by the time Lexa returns from making preparations, Clarke is three sheets to the wind and Anya is trying not to laugh as Clarke does her best to find a polite way to turn down a couple trying to lure her to bed with them.  Are all couples this open on the ground? She wonders idly. Does that mean that Lexa and her...

“Anya,” she hears, low and dangerous but no less musical to her ears.

“Lexa,” exclaims Clarke, stumbling over herself to rush to her feet. Lexa catches her before she sways too close to the fire for comfort and tucks her against her side, guiding Clarke’s nose under her clenched jaw with a gentle hand on the back of her neck. The couple, having realized exactly who they were trying to seduce, scampers off into the shadows of the night.

“Heda,” Anya drawls, pleased with herself.

“Clarke is injured,” Lexa hisses, mindful of her volume with Clarke held so closely.

“Seems fine to me,” Anya snarks.

Clutching at Lexa’s clothes (which, Clarke notes, are not the ones she’d put on this morning), Clarke nuzzles in close to her neck, “Don’t be mad.” Lexa’s jaw relaxes as Clarke whispers her case, “I didn’t remember the mead was so strong. I didn’t mean to get drunk.”

Lexa’s jaw flexes again, “Which is why Anya was meant to take care of you.”

 “Even Tris can handle her mead,” Anya defends, but even Clarke can hear it’s mostly in jest, “How should I know your sky girl can’t?”

“Lex,” Clarke distracts before Lexa can argue more with Anya, “We have a long journey tomorrow, why don’t we head to bed?”

Clarke feels the stubborn puff of hot air that Lexa huffs out through her nose, but after a moment's pause which Clarke supposes is probably a long murderous glare at Anya, Lexa guides them away from the light of the fire.

Looping an arm around Lexa’s waist, Clarke allows herself to be lead through the dirt streets of the city in the moonlight, past huts and shops until they reach a guarded tent.

The guard, towering and scarred, jumps to attention at the sight of Lexa who gives him a solemn nod as they enter.

It’s only in the light of the tent, after Lexa has deposited her on the furs, flopped on her back with her hands ceaseless in their appreciation of the soft texture, that Clarke has the light to truly scrutinize Lexa’s new clothes.

They’re dark and tight, clearly well-worn but also well-cared for, as every hole has been resealed. The fabrics are varied -- metal, leather, denim, canvas. Clarke pushes up on her elbows to watch the flex of fabric across Lexa’s backside as she turns to pour a glass on a map-covered table.

That’s when she sees the weapons.

There’s a sword strapped diagonally across her back.

When Lexa turns, cup in hand, Clarke notices the large wood-handled dagger hanging from a leather girdle around her waist and the smaller daggers in leather garters high on her thighs.

Clarke can’t help it.

She laughs.

There’s an edge of hysteria to it, and when Clarke’s eyes fill with tears she can’t tell if it’s from the laughter or if it’s because she woke up on this planet where everything is violent and strange -- on the knife edge between life and death.

Lexa takes a seat beside her, pulling her into one-armed seated hug. Hands tangling in Lexa’s braids, Clarke presses her face into her neck until her breathing levels out. She pulls back enough to rest her cheek against the cool metal of Lexa’s armor covered shoulder. The mattress shifts as Lexa stretches to set down the cup.

Gentle, calloused hands lift her head, supporting her neck on both sides. A nose brushes her own as a pair of thumbs tenderly brush blonde hair away from her wet cheeks. She’s too close to focus on Lexa’s green eyes.

Drunk and exhausted, Clarke doesn’t have the strength to keep her traitorous lips shut.

“Can I be the little spoon this time?”  


 

Lexa drifts off before she does, and Clarke wonders how much more patience the woman has for someone who can’t remember her.

Throat tight, Clarke decides the only thing that matters is her people. Nothing else.


	3. Chapter Three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clarke tries to keep Lexa at arms length with a 0% success rate.

“You’re certain you’re well?” Lexa calls from her horse for the third time in an hour.

Clarke ignores Anya’s snort behind her and lets her eyes drift toward Lexa -- not making eye contact, but looking near enough at her that she hopes it’s enough to placate her.

“I’m fine,” she says sharply through a tight-lipped smile. They’ve been riding for the better part of the day. The forest trails have begin to thin into the slopes of a valley and, though Clarke is less sore than she would expect considering she has no recollection of ever horseback riding, she still hopes this means they’re close to Polis.

Or home, as Lexa had said. Surrounded by painted, armed warriors on horseback, Clarke marvels at the idea she could ever call the ground home. The only home Clarke remembers is metal and cold, only warmed by companionship and family. Soccer games with her father, clinic visits with her mother, chess games with Wells.

A floral scent passes in the breeze and tickles her nose. She begins to list all of the things that feel foreign to her -- a jumbled list of things that have felt like the first time in the past few days.

She goes to scratch an itch on her upper thigh, but the knife Lexa had made her wear hinders her reach.

Sinking into her saddle, she recalls the argument they’d had in the morning over Clarke keeping a weapon. Clarke hadn’t been against it, not really. It had been much more about the way Lexa’s hands went to loop its leather garter sheath around her thigh in a way that felt so pedantic, so routine that Clarke couldn’t sit through it. So she faked a protest so vehement that she’d refused Lexa’s braiding afterwards, instead pulling the front pieces of her hair back into a tie herself with hopes that it’d stay out of her face.

“You there! Gangway!” calls one of the warriors of her party to a man laying in a rut of the path just ahead of them. The man doesn’t respond, not even a little, and as Clarke gets closer she can see blood on his head. She speeds her horse up.

“Clarke,” Lexa calls from beside her, keeping pace effortlessly.

Clarke slows down as she approaches the man and begins descending her horse.

“Clarke,” Lexa repeats, this time with obvious frustration. She jumps off her horse with practiced grace. “Clarke, you must be cautious.”

Less than three feet from the motionless man, Clarke turns fully to look at Lexa, “Of what, Lexa? He’s unconscious, bleeding from a head wound!”

Except he’s not, of course.

Clarke realizes this about the time she feels a blade to her throat. He’s close enough that she can smell him -- body odor, blood, dirt. She wants to shudder but she’s afraid she’ll slit her own throat on his knife. But she’s still proud, so she doesn’t meet Lexa’s eyes to give her the opportunity for an ‘I told you so’.

“There, there,” the bloody man says, “Easy does it, don’t want to hurt such a pretty thing, do we?”

Clarke watches the tremble of Lexa’s hands before they make tight, white-knuckled fists.

“Now, all I need is for your friends to hand over all their finery and I’ll be on my way,” he says, mouth so close it’s practically brushing against her as he speaks lowly in a lascivious tone that betrays the fact that he’s getting more out of this than just a paycheck. It makes her stomach roll.

“Won’t hurt a hair on your pretty little head,” he promises, punctuating his point with an exaggerated brush of her hair, pulling it out to the side and letting it fall back down against her in pieces.

A knife shoots through the air, two inches from her face. Close enough that Clarke can hear the break of bone when it hits.

The man screams, pushing her away and dropping his knife as he cradles his punctured hand. Clarke kicks his knife into the high grass and runs past Lexa toward the travelling party, where the warriors have all dismounted into a formation awaiting orders. She clumsily mounts her horse, expecting that the others are doing the same, until she’s high in her saddle with a vantage of the scene.

Lexa has a sword to the man's throat, forcing his chin up.

She can hear her speaking -- low, angry, nothing like how she speaks to Clarke, but she’s too far to make out the specifics of it.

Wiping a splatter of blood from her cheek, Clarke chokes on a strange cocktail of emotions, unsure if she wants to watch Lexa kill the man or not.

She doesn’t have to, though, because seconds later Lexa is barking out furious orders to the warriors. The man is bound roughly and lead to Lexa’s horse as she trails behind, breathing deeply and resheathing her sword. Clarke watches out of the corner of her eye as a large warrior -- Ulf, she thinks -- forces the man onto Lexa’s horse and ties the reins to his own. Clarke gulps.

Lexa doesn’t ask before she pulls herself onto Clarke’s horse, sitting behind her in the saddle. She threads her arms under Clarke’s loosely, taking the reins and gripping onto the saddle horn.

It doesn’t stop her hands from shaking.

“Carry on,” she orders.  
  
  
  


They ride straight through to Polis after that, with no breaks. Clarke is certain that the horses could’ve done with a water break or two, but not even Anya has the nerve to make requests of Lexa in her state. Her fury is palpable.

Her hands have stopped shaking but probably only because every muscle in her body feels like it’s flexed. Clarke finds herself missing the nagging questions about her wellbeing she’d endured all morning. She’s grateful when they approach the high walls of the city.

As they pass through the streets of Polis, Clarke watches the parting crowds drop into bows with reverent murmurs of ‘Heda’. She can feel the minute relax of Lexa’s posture and the sway as she blows her head in acknowledgement. It’s strange, Clarke thinks, that she doesn’t feel surprised at the multitude of Lexa’s subjects, but she supposes that she already knew about it on some level.

The convoy halts at a stable near a dilapidated tower taller than any building Clarke has ever seen. Lexa gets down first, issuing swift orders to the stable keepers and dismounting warriors. The warriors collect the bandit from horseback, pushing him forward with threats and unsheathed knives. Clarke gets down slowly, catching Anya’s eyes as they shuffle behind the commander’s purposeful steps.

“I’ll show you to the commander’s quarters,” Anya offers, but then, as if to clarify, “The quarters you share with Lexa.”

Clarke hums in the affirmative, watching Lexa turn through an archway on the left up ahead. They pass in time to see a bald man calling out ‘rise’ as the commander takes her seat on her knotted throne, but they keep moving straight through the passageway until they come upon the cage of an old-fashioned elevator.

The ride up is slow and silent until Anya speaks.

“I suppose I had not believed you to be injured,” Anya begins conversationally, as if she isn’t about to take a verbal shit on Clarke, “until I watched your witless demonstration this afternoon.”

Clarke’s only response is a sharp turn of her neck as she directs her eyes to the corner of the elevator.

“I am always impressed with your efforts to outdo your foolishness, sky girl, but certainly today cannot be outdone,” Anya laughs unkindly. “Perhaps I am fortunate that I have not discovered my tethered in this life.”

“Your tethered?” Clarke asks, pointedly ignoring Anya’s insults. Turning her head, she spots Anya’s incredulous look.

“My destined,” Anya says, looking over Clarke’s face for any indication of understanding, “in all lives. Have you not noticed the mark you’ve taken?”

The elevator stops and Anya steps out. Clarke follows after, rubbing the spot of her right arm where the tattoo rests under her leather jacket. She does her best to translate Anya’s words and her mind shifts back and forth between reincarnation and soulmates --  unscientific concepts of the old days, long-since abandoned on the Ark. Among the elite on the Ark, most marriages were arranged to ensure maximum genetic diversity and the passing of favorable traits for the next generation. Clarke’s parents were lucky to find love in such a match, but she knows people whose parents can barely stand to share quarters.

They stop in front of a door with several guards who acknowledge Clarke with familiarity which she awkwardly attempts to return. They open the door for her and she peers through into the chambers.

Her eyes widen as she tries to take it all in. The room is large and ornate, all carved woods and heavy furs. She doesn’t bother trying to count the number of candles.

“I’ll have dinner sent to you,” she hears Anya say, excusing herself. Clarke nods dumbly and steps through the doorway, allowing the guards to shut the door behind her. She brushes her hand through the soft furs of the impractically large bed, eyes drifting from the carved wood of the partitions to the open balcony. 

It’s clean but lived-in, and Clarke has no trouble determining which side of the bed she sleeps on. She studies her sketchbook, which is a mix of the sights of the city and Lexa. She finds a whole page dedicated to swatches of green and Clarke has no misconception of the shade she had been trying to replicate. She sets the book back down on her night stand.

She wanders to the adjoined bathroom, studying the antiquated plumbing systems, making plans for the oversized clawfoot tub and sniffing at the soaps to decide which one is her scent. Her eyes catch the attached walk-in closet and steps inside to investigate. Her hands linger on long, dark velvet gowns and she lets herself imagine what Lexa looks like in them and out of them.

When she returns to the bedroom, she sits down with her sketchbook and begins sketching out the innards of the Mountain.

 

 

The sun has set by the time Lexa comes to their quarters. Clarke is bent over, rubbing her hair dry with a towel in the bathroom, cloaked in a thick robe, when she hears a sound in the bedroom.

She drops the towel and gingerly enters the bedroom. Leaning against the frame of the door, she doesn’t let her eyes linger on Lexa’s boyshorts and ribbed tank top, nor the skin exposed, instead she studies the straight posture of her back as she spreads a fur over the couch. Her hair is wet like she’s bathed elsewhere and Clarke tries not to think about who else she let scrub her back.

“What are you doing?”

Lexa doesn’t jump, but she pauses. She takes a breath before she turns so sharply that Clarke braces herself to prepare for a verbal onslaught. 

But it never comes. Instead, Lexa’s eyes are downcast and Clarke could swear there’s unusual glisten to them.

“I mean to honor the customs of your people,” Lexa explains, eyes on the ground as she fluffs a pillow for her makeshift bed.

“I’m sorry, what?” Clarke asks, eyebrows raising in confusion.

Lexa’s eyes meet hers, but only for a second, before her gaze dips back to the floor. 

“Am I not to sleep here when I’ve upset you?”

Clarke is torn between laughing and crying, so instead she breathes out a pained, “Lexa,” and stalks toward her.

She pushes into Lexa’s space and nudges her chin up to meet her eyes. From this distance, Clarke can see the trail of a tear on Lexa’s right cheek. 

“You haven’t upset me,” she says, guilt festering in her gut, “It’s.. it’s everything, but it’s not you.”

“And yet it is from me that you’ve withdrawn,” Lexa says, wiping her cheek.

“Lexa, everything about this world is strange to me.” Clarke says, “And I feel you in my chest, but I can’t expect you to keep caring for someone who doesn’t remember you. Especially not when you know my people are coming.” Clarke says, pinching the bridge of her nose in an effort to push back her emotions in favor of pragmatism. 

Lexa takes a step back, and Clarke’s heart aches for a moment with the heavy belief that she was right.

But then she feels as if she’s having an out of body experience, as the commander of twelve clans kneels before her.

“Your needs are my needs. In this life and the next.” Lexa vows. Clarke wonders if it's the echo of a memory that makes the promise seem familiar or if there’s something to the grounders beliefs.

She doesn’t linger on the thought, though.

She drops to her knees and pulls the commander into a tender kiss.


End file.
